Eco-towns: Labour fears electoral backlash

Labour politicians fear they will suffer an electoral backlash over the Government's eco-town proposals.

By Patrick Sawer

5:49PM BST 31 May 2008

They are predicting further punishment at the ballot box as voters blame them for ministers pushing ahead with plans for 10 environmentally sustainable new towns.

Campaigners are already mounting protests, targeting Labour MPs and councillors who back the schemes, while nine Labour MPs, led by former Europe minister Keith Vaz, have signed a Commons motion warning the Government to listen to residents before ploughing ahead.

The guiding principle of the eco-towns is that they should be low-energy, carbon-neutral and built from recycled materials. But opponents say they will become dormitory towns with few public transport links, forcing residents to drive to work. It is also claimed that fields and woodland will be lost.

Ministers want the first five towns built by 2016, with the others completed by 2020. In at least five areas, planning and early construction work – which are likely to be accompanied by high-profile protests – would take place in the build-up to next year's local elections and to the general election, expected in 2010.

Labour politicians have admitted that at local level, Tories are using the eco-towns row as a stick to beat councillors, and that the backlash could also affect MPs.

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In Lincolnshire a 5,000-home town is proposed near the villages of Manby and Strubby, to meet the need for new homes and relocate flood-threatened communities from the coast. Opponents point out the settlement would be 15 miles from the nearest railway station and would need new roads to link it to the nearest trunk road, undermining any green credentials.

Such is the fear over the political repercussions that some senior Labour Party figures have begun to distance themselves from the schemes.Mr Vaz, chairman of the home affairs select committee, is MP for Leicester East, close to the Pennbury site where up to 15,000 homes would be built. He said: "It is of the utmost importance that the citizens of Leicester are properly consulted on these plans and their voices should be heard.

"The Government must consider the impact such a development will have on the surrounding area." Even Labour councillors who have made clear their opposition to local eco-town proposals fear voters may hold them responsible, should the schemes get the go-ahead.

Nigel Cathcart, the only Labour member on South Cambridgeshire district council, has argued against proposals for 8,000 homes to be built near the A11 as part of the Hanley Grange scheme.

He said: "I've made my views against the idea very clear, but it's possible local voters will take out their anger over the eco-town on me."

In other areas, Labour councillors are keen to show their independence from government on the issue, as a way of avoiding the future wrath of voters. Ford eco-town would see 5,000 houses on a former airfield in West Sussex.

Local Labour district councillor Mike Northeast said: "We're not lying down and having our tummy tickled by government.

"I'm worried about the planning process being rushed, which can only make people very cynical."

• Hundreds of campaigners will march this week in protest through countryside they fear will be swallowed up by the eco-town proposed on a disused airfield in Ford, West Sussex.

Olympic swimmer Duncan Goodhew and Ben Fogle, the TV presenter and columnist for The Sunday Telegraph, will be among them.

Mr Goodhew said: "Ford eco-town will engulf the rural villages of Ford, Climping and Yapton and 306 hectares of high-quality farmland. The airfield is only a small fraction of the site. Massive development of this beautiful, sensitive and unique area would be detrimental to the character of this coastal river plain and would mean an irreversible loss to the future of agriculture in the region."

Also at the march on Saturday will be the local Tory MPs Nick Herbert and Nick Gibb.

Dr Bruce Fogle, the father of Ben, urged people to join the march, saying: "If you think it's wrong to sacrifice forever our ability to grow our own food in favour of urban development, on some of the most productive arable countryside in the UK, join us on June 7."